Grumpy Gills

So I haven't really been in a blogging mood lately.
Because I'm kind of grumpy these days. 

Mostly because I hate my job.

And it makes me grumpy.

And I have to put up with people like this all day long.

Eeew.

Meet Fang

Last February Nate and I went Javelina hunting and he killed this guy

Why am I not posing with my own dead javelina you ask? Well that's because I shot...and missed...twice. But we won't rehash silly details, Nate will just rub it in.

Anyway, when Nate kills an animal and it later comes home to adorn our living room wall I like to give them names (remember Bucky?).

With that being said, meet Fang

Fang is also from southern Arizona but so far seems to be enjoying his new dwelling in the Valley. Fang is a little rough around the edges, in fact, he's earned the nickname "The Intimidator." I feel kinda bad for Bucky, since they sit on opposite sides of the living room Fang stares at Bucky all day and gives him the stink-eye...poor Bucky. 

Fang enjoys a birds-eye view of the television, prime backyard scenery via the sliding glass door, and really gives Bucky a run for his money at the quiet game. While Fang has a whole wall to himself he gets pretty territorial about "his side" of the couch. Don't worry though, Nate sets him straight real quick! 

Do I feel like my living room is starting to look like some display out of Cabela's?

Why yes, yes I do.

But that's ok, cause it just means my husband is that much more BA.

Bed Time

Nate thinks I take too long to get ready for bed.

I'm gonna have to disagree.

1.) Brush teeth

2.) Mouth wash

3.) Floss 

(flossing daily, and mouthwashing twice a day is a new years resolution of mine; so far we're doing pretty good)

4.) Take off makeup

5.) Wash face

6.) Wash face again because I'm OCD and feel like the first time around never really gets all the makeup off

7.) Wash face with scrub

8.) Dry off the counter cause I'm a messy facewasher and splash water on anything within a foot of the sink

9.) Toner 

10.) Moisturizer

11.) Swallow multi-vitamin

12.) Set alarm

(the time I wake up changes every day so it takes me a minute to figure out when I need to be up)

13.) Make Tea 

(right now I'm totally enjoying Tazo Calm tea)

14.) Turn off the lights, sit in bed, in the dark, and drink my tea in the quiet

15.) Lay down and go to sleep

Now really, what's so lengthy about all that??

...Nate's usually out by #6 

You Know You Need to do Laundry When...

You start using pillow cases you used in high school... 

Oh snap.

Winter Must Have's

So this is probably one of the most unoriginal posts ever...but clearly it hasn't stopped me from posting anyway.

Here's a list of my must have items for the winter season and colder weather!

Hemp Hand Protector

Check out this Flavor of the Week

St. Ives Invigorating Apricot Scrub

Best to slough off dead, dry, winter skin to feel new and improved! Bonus points for doubling as a facial exfoliater too!

L'Oreal Sublime Bronze

Hint: Exfoliate with St. Ives (above), moisturize with your favorite lotion, then bronze! Quick fix for winter whiteness! 

Boots

Never had a pair until this season...totally diggin' 'em

Scarves

Must Have.

Totally obsessed.

Kleenex Cool Touch

With cold and flu season going around these Kleenex literally feel cool on your nose. And I love them. And I think they're cool. And I find excuses to blow my nose in them.

And there you have it.

Happy New Year!

A for Effort...and Accuracy

Did you hear that noise?...

That's the sound of me tooting my own horn because I got Nate exactly what he asked for for Christmas. That means I get an A+ in "Gift Giving for Nathan 101." And I'm pretty proud of myself.

The reason this occasion is brag-worthy is because Nate is impossible to shop for. He is so very particular, so very specific in his tastes, and so very difficult to please if he's not buying it for himself. Everything he wants is either too expensive (can you say champagne tastes on a beer budget?), he buys it first, or I have no idea what it is or what it does. ...You can see why that would put a damper on any kind of creativity or element of surprise. 

I've enlisted the help of his buddies in years past and it still just doesn't turn out quite right. But this year was my  breakout year, I got it exactly right and he was oh so happy, which makes me oh so happy.

A million bonus points for me. ...that's right, I said a million.

Dang I'm good.

Guess what I got?!

Have I already finished season 1?

Yes. Yes I have.

Did I frantically run out to buy season 2 upon completion of season 1?

Yes. I did.

Am I already 3/4 of the way through season 2?

Yes. Yes I am.

Big Bang Theory rocks my world.

We open each others gifts early Christmas morning because we always head up North to do the Christmas day thing with Nate's Grandma and his Dad's side of the family.

 Lucky for us there was still snow on the ground! If I wasn't so tired from Christmas Eve, and was running on more than 4 hours of sleep I might've been more apt to play in the snow; but since I didn't have the luxury of either of those I decided to be a spectator to the snow ball fights. Besides, if someone hit me with a snow ball I'm pretty sure I would've ruined their Christmas day with the wrath of a less-than-8-hours-of-sleeping Rissa.

But don't worry, that didn't happen.

My sister-in-law Jessica got a dog for her birthday earlier this year and he came along with us up North. His name is Sheldon. But I think he should be named Yoda. And he had a Christmas outfit.

And if you're wondering what the definition is of "so ugly it's cute"... folks, you're lookin'  right at him:

Aww, we love Sheldon!

Hope everyone had a fabulous Christmas!

Twas the Night Before Christmas

Another Christmas has come and gone! When I was little it felt like Christmas took fooreeevverrr to get here, and now that I'm older it sneaks up on me too quickly! I was sad to take all the decorations down today and move the tree outside.

I shed a tear.

Just kidding.

But I was sad.

And I would like to proudly announce that we did not have any Christmas ornament casualties from wagging lab tails knocking them off the tree (we may have lost one...or two...or a handful last year). After learning the hard way, the bottom quarter of the tree has been established as the "Caution! Tail-wagging zone." "Hang ornament at your own risk."

Anyway, it was another great Christmas and what was even better this year was my cousin Brian and his wife Amy and their family came out and surprised us for our Christmas Eve party! We hadn't seen them in years and since they weren't able to make it out to our wedding, they hadn't even met Nate yet! 

Christmas Eve has always been the big shin-dig in my family more than Christmas day ever has. We cook lots of shrimp, eat lots of shrimp...rinse and repeat! 

And my favorite part of the night (besides all the shrimp) is our Christmas trivia game. The past several years we've been playing with prizes, and this year we had an array of food prizes! My mom, moderator extrordinaire, poses the Christmas trivia and whoever answers correctly gets to pick a prize; and from there the rules are pretty much that of a white elephant game: prizes can be stolen, 2 questions correct and you can freeze your prize, etc. etc.

And this years' game was pretty competitive.

  Throughout the duration of our trivia we learned that Sandy has a severe, and seemingly unjustified distaste for Frosty the snowman, Audrey's answer for each question is "Hark the Herald Angel's Sing!", Nate knows all the Grinch questions (coincidence??), and daddy needs to seriously hone his refereeing skills (sorry daddy, someone's gotta say it).

There was a serious battle for the bag of peanut M&M's between father and son that may or may not have left Brian sleeping on the floor for the remainder of their vacation...I'm just sayin'...I don't really know how that car ride was on the way home. Audrey tried to hide her box of Sun Chips underneath a blanket and she STILL got jacked. I ended up with a tub of Blue Bell cherry vanilla ice cream, which was DE-LISH by the way, but what I really wanted to do was steal my cousin Craig's movie-food prize with popcorn and movie candy. However, I decided against it after I sensed Craig was in an emotionally unbalanced state after he realized my mom didn't make any Maple Nut Goodie Bars this year. He made it clear to everyone that the Maple Nut Goodie Bars were in fact, NOT there and they indeed SHOULD HAVE BEEN. So to steal a man's prize out from under him, on top of the lack of Maple Nut Goodie bars would be what I would call cruel and unusual punishment.

You're welcome.

After trivia finally ended (not to worry, no one ended up in tears) we got to show the rest of the family how family picture taking is done.

Observe: 

Big arms

Show me your jump shot

Show me your mug shot

Sniff-the-pit

*In addition to our Christmas trivia, we have each person bring 3 personal questions about themselves so we can learn more about each other. This year, we learned that Sandy's celebrity crush is Tim Tebow...so this one is for Sandy =)

"Make it as difficult as possible for anyone to get up!"-Daddy

I was sitting on Nate's lap and I'm pretty sure he literally stood straight up and dumped me on top of my dad. ...I suppose he was simply following directions.

I bet Brian and Amy don't get family pics like this in Michigan...they should probably just come out to Arizona more often for Christmas time cough cough, wink wink, Bob's your uncle.